


The Dead-Eyed Huntress

by RottenFruitz



Category: Monster Hunter (Video Games)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-23
Updated: 2020-07-23
Packaged: 2021-03-05 00:14:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,417
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25455274
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RottenFruitz/pseuds/RottenFruitz
Summary: A baby is born with strange eyes.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 16





	The Dead-Eyed Huntress

This winter is unusually bitter this year.

Even the monsters who dwell and thrive in the cold are quick to admit that it is overly chilly. Nobody is quite sure why, but there has been no snow either. Instead, there has been chilling rain and blankets of ice. While some creatures have been, understandably, unable to cope, the humans who live within the forest are managing better than most (although that’s not saying much). In fact, within one of their small wooden dens, a baby is born.

The baby seems normal. She screams and cries as a human baby should, and she’s immediately thirsty and eager to feed. She is actually shockingly healthy, considering the tiny, underfed village she has been born into. Her people see how beautiful she looks and rejoice. The baby will be another mouth to feed, but they do not worry about it at that moment. They paint a bright blue streak on her forehead and name her Electra.

Electra gets older. Her eyes open during the night, when most of the village is resting. The next morning her parents are mortified. Their child has strange eyes. They are open too wide, they see too much. Her irises are almost as white as her scleras and her pupils are grey. There is a reddish tint to their edges as if she were tired.

The village doctor checks Electra and confirms she has unusually good eyesight for such a young child, but he sees no issues aside from a possible insomnia problem. He gives the fearful parents some sleeping medicine and sends them on their way.

Electra can speak now, though she hardly ever does. Her village is prosperous; there is more food to go around. The girl walks on unsteady feet and gawps quietly at the village hunters, whose polished metal weaponry hurts her eyes as they glint in the sunlight. People say she stares too much. She frightens the other children, they don’t want to get close to her. Even the adults jump a little when they notice the young girl has her eyes trained on them.

When Electra is alone—or thinks she is—she speaks to herself. When her parents ask, she says she is speaking to her brother. They tell her she has no brother, and she insists she does. The girl claims he is covered in scales. She tells her parents that he has a long neck and tail, and wings that can blow the roofs off houses. She tells them he spits fire, and one day he’ll spit burning red lightning.

The girl’s parents don’t know what to think of this. They chalk it up to an overactive imagination and nervously pat her on the head.

Electra is old enough to hunt. Not anything large, just small animals the village feeds on to survive. Her weapon, a sturdy glaive forged from bone, it isn't very powerful. The girl still doesn’t have many friends, but another brother has been born since she was small. A human brother. His name is Sami. Electra likes him quite a bit. He doesn’t seem to care that her eyes are too disturbing to look at, he loves her all the same.

Meanwhile, the girl’s dragon-brother still talks to her when neither of them are busy. He says that he’s having confusing dreams. In the dreams, he is living the lives of other dragons before him. Electra also confesses to going through the same thing. She says all the people she saw looked a lot like her, too. Her dragon-brother excitedly exclaims that it's been the same for him. When they are awake, they ponder the meaning of these dreams together. One day, Electra comments on how strange it is that her dragon-brother has no name. After a bit of debate, the two not-quite-siblings agree to call him Alis, because it sounds pleasing.

The young girl is not very young anymore. She is apprenticed to one of the village hunters that made it big out in the world. Before Electra begins her work, the hunter takes her to find a palico partner. They find an oily black one that has named himself after ricotta cheese. Electra and Ricotta get along well. Like Sami, the lynian doesn’t care that Electra’s eyes are unsettling. He purrs and tells Electra he is overjoyed to be joining her as an apprentice. Now that the girl has begun hunting properly, Alis has grown quieter. The dragon has been hunting more, too, so he has less time to speak. He says there are other dragons like him, some with beautiful manes or eyes that can look in two directions at once, but they do not speak to him. They fear him; he assumes it must be his eyes.

One day while Electra hunts, Alis asks why humans roast their prey before they eat it. Electra shrugs, kills the aptonoth she was hunting, and says it is to burn the disease out of them. The siblings, out of curiosity, decide to swap eating customs for a day. Electra eats her aptonoth raw as soon as she kills it, tearing off strips of flesh and gulping them down as whole as she can. Ricotta and the hunter are perturbed by this, but not perturbed enough to say anything about it. Alis roasts his meat using the large slabs of rubble in his territory as stove tops. He finds everything quite delicious when it has been artificially warmed up. There is no one to be perturbed by him.

Electra is a hunter now. She spent many nights training with Alis, and she has become stronger than usual as a result. People know her as a master of her craft, but also as the Dead-Eyed Huntress. Most regard her with caution. They nervously stutter around her as if she might hurt them if they speak out of line. Electra has a handler now, a wyverian called Amber. She is a little afraid of Electra’s eyes, but she is always cheerful and kind. Alis doesn’t like her, but he doesn’t like much nowadays. When Electra has a quiet moment to herself, she asks why her dragon-brother has become so bitter. Alis responds by saying his dreams have taught him many things about people; about other dragons; about the world.

Alis says humans are a plague. A blight. He hates them. But he hates dragons, too. He says that nowadays they are dull, stupid things. No better than people. He wishes he could walk among his ancestors during the days of the ancients, when people and dragons were magnificent and clever creatures. Electra has learned things from her own dreams, too, but hesitates to tell Alis about them. She has seen something terrible. Something that chills her to her very core. But for the moment, she simply nods and agrees with whatever her dragon-brother tells her.

Both siblings are older now. Hair has sprouted along Alis's back and face. He will not be elderly for a while, but he has grown the signature beard and mane that his elders have all worn. This is unusual, but he likes it. He peers into puddles of blood and grimy water and admires his features on the rare occasions his territory has clear skies. Electra has become an adult as well. She has her hair dyed a striking blue, a color choice that Alis loathes. Her eyes are still the same and they still unnerve those who peer into them, but they are noticeably redder than usual. Rumors say that when an elder dragon looks into them, they see something so frightening they flee.

Electra is in high standing with the Guild. They reveal secrets to her, secrets of powerful dragons that are purposely kept away from the common folk. The huntress reads through the reports and finds one that makes her heart skip a beat. It is a report about her dragon-brother. In it is Alis’s full name.

Fatalis.

Electra and Alis do not talk much anymore. Electra knows too much now. She does not want to believe it. This cannot be her destiny, but she sees no way out of it. She has seen each Electra before her beg and plead with the Fatalis before Alis; each one had no choice. Alis senses Electra’s despair and asks her why she is so troubled. Electra reveals what her dreams have told her, and the two siblings really, truly fight for the first time since they were born.

**Author's Note:**

> Thought it'd be fun to make a quick thing where my Monster Hunter oc had a spirit bond(?) with a fatalis. I mean, she's always described as having unsettling eyes so it was neat to write something that 'explained' them being that way, even if it couldn't happen in canon (and they're just that way because that's naturally how they look).


End file.
